The invention relates to installation and removal of components of a computer.
A typical computer system has memory that stores programs and data. Quite often, the memory is formed from several dynamic random access memory (DRAM) or synchronous DRAM (SDRAM) memory semiconductor packages, or chips. To aid in the removal or addition of several memory chips at once, groups of memory chips typically are packaged together to form a memory board, or memory module (e.g., a SIMM or a DIMM).
The memory module typically includes several memory chips which are mounted to a printed circuit board (PCB). The PCB has circuitry that electrically connects the memory chips together, and the PCB is constructed to plug into memory module connector slot of the system and electrically connect the memory chips to the connector slot.
Typically, to replace a memory module of the system, power to the computer system must be turned off. As a result, operations (e.g., executing software programs) on the system typically must be shut down to install or remove memory modules.